Monthly Archives: September 2011

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Assuming I’m alive and well, I will wade into Lake Okanagon around 6:45 a.m. on August 26th, 2012.

It’s only taken me about fifteen years to commit to going crazy long—2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, and 26.2 mile “run”. My brother, who calls it Ironman Canada, did it when he was in his early 40s. Me at 50, figure that’s a fair fight.

Why now when I haven’t been racing at any distance? A perfect storm of cognitive slippage, turning 50, watching my friends race all summer, getting stronger on the bike, and reflecting on the GalPal’s health struggles.

I’m more anxious than excited because it’s the most I’ve ever asked of my bod. The training is going to require unprecedented self-discipline and I’m going to suffer big time on race day. I’ve already lost some sleep with jarring images of the swim start and “running” for four hours plus in 90 degree weather after 112 miles in the saddle.

If it’s 90+ degrees on the run like it was this year, my brother’s family record of 11:45 is probably safe. I know he’ll be rooting for me. . . to blow up early in the run.

Can’t wait to embrace the triathlon subculture I’m so enamored with. I love the World Triathlon Corporation’s single-minded bidness focus so I’ve decided to rent myself out to the highest bidder. That’s right, I’m officially for sale. NASCAR has nothing on me. I’ve already been contacted by representatives from AAPL, Coca-Cola, and Tide. I’ll wear their logos, or if the price is right, have them permanently tattooed on the body part of their choice.

I’m going to use that revenue flow to hire a coach who I will pay more than two-thirds of the world’s people earn. Also, don’t tell the GalPal, but I’ll be tapping our retirement accounts to buy lots of very expensive bike equipment, shaving grams as I go. Hyperbaric chambers aren’t cheap either.

And rest assured, I’ll embrace the narcissism that often seems endemic to the sport. That means I’ll be posting pillions of pictures of myself getting fitter and fitter and blogging about all of my training details until every last reader’s eyes glaze over. And even though my brother looked roided up in 2002, I’ve decided to race clean, again in an effort to level the playing field.

Just kidding. My primary goal is to put in the necessary work without letting it take over my life. More easily written than done I suppose. Appropriately starting on April 1, just under five months of prep. Eight week build, followed by eleven weeks of high volume, and a ten day taper.

Ron Byrnes has agreed to coach me. And with the goal of not letting it take over my life, I don’t intend on blogging much about my prep. If all goes well, I will toe the line in the best shape of my life and then race smartly, meaning steadily.

Can I put in the work without breaking down or losing balance, survive the swim start, avoid tacks on Maclean Creek, run slowly all afternoon instead of walking, go sub 11:45, and get home without cramping up uncontrollably and driving off the road?

With apologies to Lorne, swim-bike-run posts today and Friday. We return to regular programming Monday, October 3rd.

Like Brett Farvah, came out of retirement to compete in the Black Diamond Half Iron last Saturday. The weather was ideal, calm, partially sunny, 60’s-lower 70’s.

Only my second half iron—1.2 mile swim/56 mile bike/13.1 mile run. Finished in 5:13+ in 2006 after cycling too hard for my fitness and unraveling on the run. Took me five years to recover.

The deets—30:42 swim, 3:12 T1, 2:42:54 bike, 1:52 T2, 1:40:09 run, 4:58:49. One of the athletic accomplishments I’m most proud of along with extricating myself from the top of my roof after getting spread eagled putting on Christmas lights and scoring five goals in a sophomore water polo game against Western High in Cypress, CA back in the typewriter era.

Chillin' pre-race

Heaven help me if Chip Schooler ever sees this playlist!

Went in with modest swim volume and three short runs off the bike. Hadn’t ran 13.1 in ages either. On the other hand, my cycling was really solid all summer, I’ve strengthened my core, and I’ve been churning out 30 mile running weeks. Despite being fit, I was nervous about going out too fast and then unraveling again. So the plan was to stay within myself, cruise/bilateral breathe throughout the swim, keep the cadence high on the bike, and run conservatively from start to finish.

The fog just waiting for the start gun

Fog rolled in right as we were starting the swim. It was a two loop .6 mile diamond shaped course so the buoys were closer together than normal, but the fog got so thick it was hard to see them. I was sighting off the arms of a guy in front of me in a sleeveless wetsuit. Felt like I zigged and zagged a bit inside and outside the buoy-line which gives me a sponsorship idea.

The other problem with the swim was I couldn’t dial it back after going hard for the first 150 yards to get into some open water. I didn’t bilateral breathe once and swam harder than I had intended. Theme of the day. Decent time/start.

The bike course was nice, wide shoulders, smooth pavement, rolling. Just over 2k’ in elevation. And it was the cleanest race I’ve ever seen. A couple out and backs, two loop course so lots of opportunities to see others, and not one instance of drafting. With my road bike, pseudo-aero bars, and non-race wheels, I was outgunned in the hardware department, but I put up an admirable fight. I also road differently, like the roadie I am, standing on the climbs, coasting in a crouch on the descents, only aero maybe half of the time. Everyone else seemed like they were aero all the time, always seated, pedaling downhill, perfect spike-free wattage charts no doubt. My wattage chart would probably resemble that of a major earthquake.

Late in the ride, going pretty hard at over 20mph, I felt a wee bit of lactic acid forming. Internal dialogue. “How are you planning to run after this?” Again, couldn’t get out of my mod-hard groove. “We’ll, we’ll know whether we rode too hard by the two mile mark of the run.”

The run was on rural roads with a couple of out and backs, one ran twice. I liked it because again you could see where you were relative to the other competitors. Right out of T2, I exited stage left into a PortaPit. I’ve watched televised college football games that took less time than that whiz.

Once I started running in earnest, a 25 year old passed me like I was standing still. I figured that was a good sign that I hadn’t started too fast. Shortly afterwards, he cramped up and stopped. Eventually he recovered and later passed me, ultimately finishing about a minute ahead of me. Youthful exuberance, terrible pacing. Only dude to pass me during the run (because the burners outcycled me)*. I was cruising, thinking I was running my planned 8:00/minute miles, but my splits were crazy fast–7/7:20ish. What the hell? I had my legs and the turnover was there. I began picking off people, looking past the person in front of me to the one in front of them and then pulling them back. Only once got out of my comfort zone when I didn’t realize the road had kicked up a few degrees.

I was cruising so comfortably I was pre-writing this blog post in my head, not racing per se, just running within myself, not chasing people, just watching them come back to me. Then everything changed at mile 8. I decided my 7:20’s were suicidal and decided to sit on a guy I ran up on until mile 10. “Use him to slow down,” I told myself. Just about then, my hammies seized up as they often do when I ask too much from them. Did the straight legged walk a bit, managed to work it out enough to slowly jog to the aid station, downed some electrolyte drink, and then eased back into running. Too strong of a performance to succumb to walking. Now 43 (his age as noted on his right calf) was at least 100 meters up on me. Both hammies were on the edge, but I tentatively pressed on.

Between mile posts 10 and 11, I came back up on 43 and now 46 who he was sitting on. Pass or rest for the final two miles? I decided not to adjust my pace and made the pass. 43 said something like “Didn’t know if you were cramped up for good” and I assured both of them I was on the edge and my hammies could go at any minute especially on the downhills. Didn’t know if one or both would come with me, but neither was able to. Finished steadily over the last mile of trail around the lake. I was pleasantly surprised by my run and the day more generally.

Walked straight to the beach, stripped down to the bike shorts, and disappeared into the cold lake. Nothing speeds recovery like that. Well, besides a Big Tom’s chocolate shake.

* Except for John Brewer (47) of Kirkland. Check out his splits for a chuckle. I went to the race director to get a print out of the results so the mean lady guarding the age group awards would give me mine. Tangent—if I had known it was another very hokey (made in China) medal with nothing imprinted on it and not the cool clear/plexiglass engraved plaques for the winners, I wouldn’t have bothered. Anyways, I watched the Race Director spend fifteen minutes trying to explain to JB that he cut the course. He was incredulous. The Race Director drew a detailed map of the course and went over it and over it. Then afterwards his friend said “Yeah, I should have seen you here (pointing to an out and back on the hand drawn map) and I never did.” I would have been more direct than the Race Director. “You were 102nd in the swim, 78th in the bike, but somehow rallied to run the fifth fastest run split of the day?! Any relation to Rosie Ruiz?!”

The North Korean dictatorship now sees tourists on cruises as the best way to generate some foreign currency with which they can keep buying western luxury goods for themselves. Fifty-four pictures here.

Do the mostly Chinese tourists have no conscience? Don’t they realize they’re propping up the most heinous dictatorship in the world?

Easy to rip them I suppose, harder to reflect on the ways our travels sometimes negatively impact the people and cultures we visit.

When teaching and living in Ethiopia, I took what I thought at the time was an excellent picture that captured the harsh reality of poverty in the developing world. It was of two young girls who had hiked up to the top of the hills north of the capital city, Addis Ababa, with a huge thicket of wood branches on their tiny arched backs. Technically it was National Geo-like, and even more impressive after the excellent matting and framing job. After having it hanging in our home for quite a few years, the haunting, absent look on the girls’ faces started to trouble me. Despite being someone who values my privacy, I hadn’t asked for their permission. I raised my camera with my fancy zoom lens, pointed it right at them, and snapped.

There was no reciprocity in our interaction, no balance. I’ve since taken it down and use it as a discussion starter when teaching about cultural globalization.

I have other similarly unflattering travel stories. We don’t like to think about, let alone tell those stories though, opting instead for innocuous ones as if our travels are apolitical.

To mitigate our negative impact, maybe we should travel less often, over shorter distances. And when we do travel far afield, we should strive to do so as global citizens, not amoral global tourists like the damn Chinese on the North Korean cruises.

The wife recently asked me to take the Jung/Myers Briggs personality test available here. Probably wanted to find out what’s wrong with me. It was relatively pain free and the results mostly jived with my sense of self. Take it and tell me what you think of the results.

I’m an INFJ or “Idealist Counselor”. Here are some excerpts from the “Idealist Counselor” description:

Counselors have an exceptionally strong desire to contribute to the welfare of others, and find great personal fulfillment interacting with people, nurturing their personal development, guiding them to realize their human potential. Although they are happy working at jobs (such as writing) that require solitude and close attention, Counselors do quite well with individuals or groups of people, provided that the personal interactions are not superficial, and that they find some quiet, private time every now and then to recharge their batteries. Counselors are both kind and positive in their handling of others; they are great listeners and seem naturally interested in helping people with their personal problems. Not usually visible leaders, Counselors prefer to work intensely with those close to them, especially on a one-to-one basis, quietly exerting their influence behind the scenes.

Except for the fact that I could be a much more patient listener, that’s accurate to the point of almost creepy. Helps explain why I prefer small dinner get-togethers to large cocktail parties and why I loathe self-promoters. There’s more.

Counselors are scarce, little more than three percent of the population, and can be hard to get to know, since they tend not to share their innermost thoughts or their powerful emotional reactions except with their loved ones. They are highly private people, with an unusually rich, complicated inner life. Friends or colleagues who have known them for years may find sides emerging which come as a surprise. Not that Counselors are flighty or scattered; they value their integrity a great deal, but they have mysterious, intricately woven personalities which sometimes puzzle even them.

Isn’t blogging going against the Counselor grain? Not necessarily. I share thoughts and emotions, but not my innermost thoughts or most powerful emotional reactions. I’ll probably peel more layers off over time, but never get to the core in this format at least.

Counselors tend to work effectively in organizations. They value staff harmony and make every effort to help an organization run smoothly and pleasantly. They understand and use human systems creatively, and are good at consulting and cooperating with others. As employees or employers, Counselors are concerned with people’s feelings and are able to act as a barometer of the feelings within the organization.

That explains in part why I’ve been in a professional funk. My workplace has lacked harmony for quite awhile. Outnumbered by those who think people’s feelings are unimportant, I’ve thrown in the towel on trying to help things run smoothly and pleasantly.

Blessed with vivid imaginations, Counselors are often seen as the most poetical of all the types, and in fact they use a lot of poetic imagery in their everyday language. Their great talent for language-both written and spoken-is usually directed toward communicating with people in a personalized way. Counselors are highly intuitive and can recognize another’s emotions or intentions – good or evil – even before that person is aware of them. Counselors themselves can seldom tell how they came to read others’ feelings so keenly. This extreme sensitivity to others could very well be the basis of the Counselor’s remarkable ability to experience a whole array of psychic phenomena.

Psychic phenomena strikes me as over the top. And do you think they purposely write all the descriptions as positively as possible so that everyone feels better about themselves? And you gotta love the examples of other Counselors—Gandhi, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jane Goodall. Nice company to keep. I’m a confident writer and speaker, but as clearly demonstrated in Wednesday’s “Fall” post, I’m anything but poetic. And when it comes to others’ feelings, my antenna do seem more finely tuned than most.

For example, I picking up on things right now. You think I’ve been a bit self-absorbed in this post and I’ve gone on too long. Points well taken.

“Don’t ask, don’t tell” is no more. The policy barred openly gay, lesbian or bisexual people from serving in the military.

As to what really propelled the change: changes in attitudes in the country as a whole, shifting attitudes among top military brass, gay activism, legal action and the increasing needs of a military waging several wars.

In Adler’s story, Sue Fulton, a West Pointer and former Army Captain, cut to the chase:

When we’re at war what matters is: Do you have my back? Are you supporting me down range? All of this other nonsense about who is waiting for you back home, or what the color of your skin is, or who you worship, those things don’t matter when you’re down range, when you are under fire. It comes down to do you have the character and the ability to have my back. Gays and lesbians have proven throughout this conflict that they do.

In twenty-five to fifty years, we’ll look at the last few decades of anti-gay posturing and policy in the same way we do Jim Crow-based racial segregation today.

A record high one of six people are living below the $22,000 family of four poverty level. Tampa right wing nutters cheered the thought of an uninsured patient dying. Recently hired Detroit auto workers are paid one-half of their fellow assembly-liners’ wages. The University of California will raise tuition 16% a year indefinitely. The Palin kids were (allegedly) stuck with burnt mac and cheese (formatting guide—italics—quotes,underlined—tongue in cheek sarcasm). And then the week ended with the rare Seahawks-Mariners double zero*.

In keeping with the spirit of the week, Stephanie Banchero of the WSJ wrote:

SAT scores for the high-school graduating class of 2011 fell in all three subject areas, and the average reading and writing scores were the lowest ever recorded.

The results. . . revealed that only 43% of students posted a score high enough to indicate they were ready to succeed in college.

The report on the SAT comes on the heels of results from the ACT college-entrance exam that suggested only 25% of high-school graduates who took that exam were ready for college.

The average reading score dropped to 497 from 500 points in 2010, on a 200-to-800-point scale. That is the lowest score since 1972, when the College Board began calculating the average scores of individual graduating classes. The writing score dipped to 489, down from 491 last year. Writing scores have gone down almost every year since the exam was first given in 2006.

College Board officials offer two take-aways from the data (as reported by Banchero):

1) The declining scores can be attributed, in part, to a larger and more diverse test-taking population. As more students aim for college and sit for the exam, scores decline. Ten years ago, 8% of test takers were Latino, compared with 15% in 2011. For black students, the percentage jumped to 13%, compared with 9% in 2001. A growing percentage of students also grew up speaking a language other than English, and more than one-fifth of this year’s test takers were poor enough to receive a waiver to take the exam for free.

2) Students who took a core curriculum, defined as four years of English and three or more of math, natural science and social science, did much better. Still, only 49% of them posted a score high enough to be considered college-ready, compared with 30% of students who didn’t take a core. College Board officials noted that the reading scores have been declining most dramatically for students who took less than a core curriculum.

Banchero wraps up her story with Kent Williamson’s hypothesis for why reading and writing scores are declining. Williamson, the executive director of the National Council of Teachers of English, suspects declining scores are based upon a narrowing of how reading is taught. “In many schools, especially those most impoverished, reading programs are not about building cognitive abilities or a love of reading,” he said. “They are built around rote learning of language, and I think we are seeing the results of that.”

Unscientific as it may be, Williamson’s postulate resonates with me. Too few students are engaged by their teachers’ methods and their required, too often scripted, course material.

I’ll take the baton from Williamson and offer another unscientific hypothesis. Declining scores are proof that opinion leaders’ and policy makers’ single-minded focus on global economic competition isn’t the least bit motivating to K-12 students. That focus has created a debilitating disconnect. I’ll elaborate sometime soon.

In the meantime, here’s hoping for a more upbeat news week.

* I like our chances for setting the rarely reported “same city on Sundays consecutive quarters and innings goose egg” record.